


vacancy

by sunflower_8



Series: who we are [4]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Depression, Introspection, Mental Breakdown, Minor, Suicidal Thoughts, vent - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-15
Updated: 2020-01-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:48:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22262116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflower_8/pseuds/sunflower_8
Summary: kaede akamatsu has an episode.
Series: who we are [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1489475
Comments: 6
Kudos: 32





	vacancy

sometimes, kaede akamatsu has to teach herself how humans act, manually forcing her steps and words as though pulling them out of a snug enclosure.

———————————————————

she stares at the wall, noting the beige color. noting how ugly it is, how the texture isn’t smooth, how there are dark brown chips in the paint and it doesn’t fit. it really doesn’t. she dislikes the wall in the same way she dislikes everything, but she persists in staring because she’s only ever known how to observe. twisted lies and voices will call her proactive, and that’s fine, because that’s what they expect of her. desire of her. but she isn’t a girl of action; she watches herself crumble in the outline of reality she lives in, and her fingers barely twitch forward to break free.

nobody is going to knock on her door. they are all so used to the bad days, to the fact that some people never open the damn door, so they stop asking questions. sometimes, if someone passes by a door left ajar, or needs to know that they’re all alive, or just really needs to borrow some tissues, they will walk inside to help. but they won’t find any crying or flashbacks in kaede’s disaster of a room.

(she gave away the tissues, anyway. it was a stiff exchange: gonta asked with a voice like gravel and a threatening stare, and she handed it over. he mumbled a thank you and left. kaede’s pretty sure the sniffles started in the hallway, but she didn’t chase after him. she just laid in her bed, looking at the ceiling, trying to pretend it wasn’t predictable)

kaede’s dad died from a heart attack a month after she ‘signed up’ for danganronpa. kaede never got to see her father’s last moments, but she can picture gasping breaths escaping her mother and her sister cursing. supposedly, it feels similar to grief, like an elephant resting on your chest. kaede isn’t grieving, though, and she’s not suffering from a hereditary fate. she’s just... exhausted. 

(not in the same way kokichi gets exhausted, because he never sleeps. not in the way maki gets exhausted, because she never eats. not in the way himiko gets exhausted, because she tries. kaede gets exhausted because she sleeps and eats yet her heart beats a little slower than usual because she never tries.)

kaede isn’t the kind for self loathing. not that it’s for a certain kind of person, but still. she’s accepted that she’s a cold, hollow bitch. she  _ knows _ . she just doesn’t think about it much; there’s no point pondering what will never change. still, as she’s laying like a corpse and exhaling evenly (with a hiccup), she wonders if there’s something wrong with her. 

she can relate to the others, of course. how hard maki tries to inspire hope. the sluggish way himiko floats through life, leaning on a cane. when she looks out the window to see ryoma smoking while kirumi plays with blades of grass— it feels too much like a mirror. kaede is still tethered to the world, no matter how much she wishes she isn’t. 

but there’s a little pause. enough for kaede to know she’s a failure, in many senses. she registers that team danganronpa has been keeping mail from her sister away from her, but she never once feels upset at it. she knows she’s too fucking cruel, and when shuichi cries on her shoulder she should say something that the ultimate pianist might say, but she just comments on his disheveled figure and leaves before the apologies. she’s so unapologetic for all the vices she’s committed. she’s a wicked woman, as wicked as tsumugi shirogane, and she should be burned at the stake for it. her fists clench, and she feels it bubbling up, festering like an alcoholic drink fermenting, and yet-

she doesn’t fucking move. every bit of her saying she should destroy the room, throw picture frames at the wall, do something, fades to her lack of motivation. she always prefers the carbonation over the actual taste of soda, because the stillness is so lukewarm. she can try- because oh god does she try- to fix herself, to make herself angry. but she always stops before the peak, like a fucking tease, and gives up. she wants to be alive so,  _ so _ bad, alive like the millions of people she loathes for existing, because humanity is alive and it’s so lucky but so damning too. she wants to be alive, because the shroud—flowers embroidered—she lays in is suffocating like the guilty air outside.

she wants to be dead so much more.

she sighs and closes her eyes. the images of her own execution, projected on an hd screen, haunt her, but she doesn’t care enough. she’s more annoyed by the out of tune piano destroying a perfectly good melody. she’s more angered that it doesn’t hurt. she keeps her eyes closed, and wonders if she deserves this: the numbing pain that she’s always felt.

she barks out a laugh. of course she does.

_ the antagonist in me makes a damn good hero _ . 

she sighs, chapped lips bleeding, and sinks into the mattress like a lifeboat, punctured and pleading.

she doesn’t awaken.

(but she’s not dead, not asleep, and isn’t that so fucking tragic? she’s alive, they shout like hallelujah, but she’s damned.)

**Author's Note:**

> welcome back to sunflower venting
> 
> i wrote this a while back in a depression episode and now i’m in another depression thing and my friend gave me a metaphor about like cake and posting so enjoy the cake everyone 
> 
> someday i’ll stop being a depressed ass bitch but for now we’re here.


End file.
